1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus and a medical wound dressing for aspirating, irrigating, and/or cleansing wounds, and a method of treating wounds using such apparatus for aspirating, irrigating, and/or cleansing wounds.
It relates in particular to such an apparatus, wound dressing and method that can be easily applied to a wide variety of, but in particular chronic, wounds, to cleanse them of materials that are deleterious to wound healing, whilst distributing materials that are beneficial in some therapeutic aspect, in particular to wound healing.
2. Description of the Related Art
Aspirating and/or irrigating apparatus are known, and tend to be used to remove wound exudate during wound therapy. In known forms of such wound therapy, aspiration and irrigation of the wound generally take place sequentially.
Such known forms of aspiration and/or irrigation therapy systems also often create a wound environment that may result in the loss of optimum performance of the body's own tissue healing processes, and slow healing, and/or in weak new tissue growth that does not have a strong three-dimensional structure adhering well to and growing from the wound bed. This is a significant disadvantage, in particular in chronic wounds.